


Commander Shepard Never Cries (except when she does)

by StrandsofNehn



Series: Viola Shepard [6]
Category: Mass Effect, Mass Effect 3 - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Implied Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-02
Updated: 2016-05-02
Packaged: 2018-06-06 00:08:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6728833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrandsofNehn/pseuds/StrandsofNehn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Angsty fic because I have no restraint. Can be seen as any femshep. There's an implied sex scene at the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Commander Shepard Never Cries (except when she does)

 

She's seen a lot. Done a lot of it. Killed too many, saved too few- with the reverse somehow still true. It feels like static. Everything is the same. Ammo. Flares. Politics and old feuds. Sabotage. People die. Friends die. 

She dies.

She came back though. How is that even possible? She feels the same and that feels wrong. Where are all her scars? Her old brand? Where is the evidence she even lived at all?

She supposes it is all internal now. On the inside she has lived a thousand lifetimes, longer than even Asari -or Krogan. Wrex feels like a peer in life experience. She's only thirty something. 31? 33? How does _that_  math work?

There are times when Liara asks her if she is okay that she wants to claw her own eyes out and scream with everything in her that "NO SHE'S NOT AND IT'S FUCKING RIDICULOUS THAT YOU EVEN ARE ASKING." But, of course, she doesn't. There are times that Wrex accuses her of "having all the fun" and she wants to step aside, with a sick smile painted on and let him kill people for a change. Just so she can breathe. Maybe lock herself in the shuttle bay and take out her frustrations on all those cargo crates in a fury of biotic power and **rage**.

She's sure she could show up a Krogan with all her rage.

If she ever allows herself to express it, that is.

She won't.

Just like how she won't cry out of frustration, exhaustion, death, the odds. Friends dying. Billions dying. She will not cry about the slaughter of the entire galaxy. She will not cry about being thrust in the front of it, about how they made her entirely responsible for billions and billions of lives.

She will not cry at her outrage.

She grits her teeth and shuts her eyes.

Breathe. She needs to breathe.

That's something about space she... that she sometimes can't stand. It's impossible to just- go outside and get some fresh air. She can't leave the ship. And she can't look out into space and ignore the clench in her chest and the ache in her lungs as she relives her own death. How many nights had she locked her cabin tight? Ordered Edi to shut all the hard shields over the windows so she wouldn't have to look up from her bed and see what killed her?

Her heart’s racing, and she's not breathing right. She-

Suck it up, Shepard. In and out. Come on, soldier.

"Shepard?"

She looks up, lifts her head from her hands but even as her mind is screaming to make herself presentable, she just looks at him. Garrus.

"Are you alright?" He looks at her in concern, something she had to learn to see in him. His voice gives much more of his emotions away and she has always wondered if it’s intentional.

"Stupid question," he states and walks over to where she's curled on the edge of her bed, "you're obviously not."

He sits down next to her and only hesitates a moment before he lifts a hand to tuck her hair behind her ear. She closes her eyes and lets out a shuddering breath and enjoys his touches on her scalp and gentle tugging on her hair when he runs into a tangle. She leans her forehead onto his shoulder, by his crest.

"I don't know what's wrong with me."

A lie and a truth all in one.

He hums, and the sound of it vibrates through her.

"You're a soldier, Shepard. There's nothing wrong with you that isn't wrong with the rest of us."

She shudders as she exhales. True enough, she supposes.

"Are you going to tell me to keep it to myself?"

His hands are constant, moving from her hair to her back in reassuring touches.

"Why would I do that?"

"It's what I've been telling myself."

"No, I won't say that. I asked you to come up for air, remember?"

She nods, she remembers. Back when this all detonated, his request of her in the refugee housing. The smell of piss and fear and metal.

"You said that you needed me."

"I still do," he insists and squeezes her a little closer. "And it goes both ways. I am here for you, whenever you need me."

She nods because she knows that. And she chuckles a little, but she's not sure why.

"Got my six?"

"Always."

Relief, that's what it is.

"I've got you, Shepard."

She nods, because she knows that, too- because that's all she's capable of.

"I love you."

She sniffs and utters, "I love you too" before it dissolves into sobs, shaky tears that rack through her and have her clutching onto him, trying to anchor herself to something. Her tears flood out of her, and she's enough to form a new ocean for herself to cross.

He doesn't say much, or he does and she she can't hear him over the pounding of her heart and the heat in her ears. He pulls her close and settles her on his lap like a child and it’s only then she realizes he's out of his armor. She curls into him, drawing in the warmth of his skin through his clothes.

Then without them.

The roughness of him is her anthem and the once tentative and new nature of their togetherness is gone. Now, just as well as she knows his steady countenance and support, she knows his touch. He knows hers. It's not something... alien. It's a piece of home.

She stops sobbing half way through and the tears stop, only to start again when she's coming down from heights so high she didn't know she could reach until recently. His arms are steady around her, her hands are settled underneath his fringe and the tears are slow and warm but not at all unwelcome.

He brushes his forehead to hers, "I've got you," he reminds her.

She kisses him.

 

 

 


End file.
